June 22, 2000 Fila Forum, Milan, ITY
setlist : Of The Girl, Corduroy, Grievance, God’s Dice, Animal, Given To Fly, Rival, Elderly Woman, Even Flow, Not For You, Thin Air, Light Years, MFC, Present Tense, Daughter/5 minute chant with crowd, Jeremy, Go enc 1: Nothingman, Sleight of Hand, Better Man, Wishlist, Insignificance, Rearviewmirror, Do The Evolution, Garden, State of Love and Trust, Black enc 2: Smile, Rockin’ In The Free World notes: Excellent show — the band is on — Stone is more animated tonight. Not quite on fire, but definitely on. INCREDIBLE audience. Ed is sporting the striped jacket at the start of the show again. At one point, a soccer ball reaches the stage and Ed plays a bit, with Jeff being the goalkeeper and blocking the ball with his bass. Much singing, much hand-clapping in the middle of songs, many lighters held up, and much yelling “hey, hey, hey” and such. In fact, the audience takes the ‘Daughter’ tag away from Ed. Just as he is getting ready to sing something, the crowd starts singing/yelling “hey, hey, hey.” Ed is taken aback but delighted. He goes with it and starts singing various sounds to see if the audience will repeat, and they do! Then he decides to have a little fun with it and sings at a higher and higher key until the audience cannot follow along. The extended tag ends with Ed dropping to his knees as if to pay homage to the audience. After ‘Not For You,’ Ed says, “… of course it was not for Italy, this is for you…if you are in love.” ‘Not for You’s’ slow ending (played only by Ed and Jeff) leads gracefully into ‘Thin Air.’ ‘MFC’ is introduced by Ed saying that the last time he was in Italy he fell in love: “She was beautiful and small … she had four wheels and was called ‘mini’. This is a song about my love for her.” ‘Present Tense’ is played with only Mike and Ed, Stone appearing before the second chorus, and Jeff and Matt after. Ed takes maybe four audience polaroids immediately after returning for the first encore. He then holds up the pictures and says, “These are pictures of the best singers in the world. If you are still good, we will play a lot more. Get comfortable.” Ed introduces ‘Sleight of Hand’ by saying it is a new song that the audience might not know very well. Introducing ‘Wishlist,’ Ed says that this is one of the best times he has had here. Awesome jamming moment during the ending distortion of ‘RVM.’ Ed says, “Since this is the fashion capitol of the world, let’s try this on,” leading to ‘Garden.’ Before “Smile,” Ed comments, “This is how we are gonna feel.” Ed throws a harmonica to a specific person in the crowd at the end of ‘Smile.’ The wrong person apparently gets it and Ed attempts to interfere but then backs off looking satisfied. (The fan who gave up the harmonica got a pick.) He says that it’s a long story but that he just saw something beautiful happen. A great version of ‘RITFW’ ends the show.